Lieu pour l’imagination artistique et citoyenne

Better being a virus than catching a cold

Mieux vaut être un virus que tomber malade (better being a virus than catching a cold) referring to artist Wim Delvoye’s wit, deals with resisting methods and possible alternatives. As today, hypercapitalism seems to be the only reasonable economic model, contemporary artists’ political involvement is slightly different from the activists’ in the 1970’s. This exhibition shows artists whose criticizing positions aren’t as obvious, using infiltration strategies in everyday life, giving way to situations or objects that may improve the world or reveal its system. Out of the art sphere into the world, the artworks melt down with social and economic reality. Not necessarily bringing a solution, they cause instability, awkwardness or short-circuits.

There is no alternative, Margaret Thatcher 1980
Now, when a strike occurs, nobody even notices, Nicolas Sarkozy, 2008

Watch the video of the show :

After his studies, artist Julien Prévieux was looking for a job, going through the classifieds, he wrote cover letters. Disappointed with all the pre-written negative answers, he decided to write non-cover letters. In these lettres de non-motivation, he explains why he does not want to apply for the job offer. Eight years later, Prévieux owns a thousand letters of which a part was just published. Ironically enough, in a few stores, the Lettres de non motivation are found along with the job-hunting books. Not identified as artworks, the Lettres act as a virus offering an alternative to the formatted language of employment and career.
Mieux vaut être un virus que tomber malade (better being a virus than catching a cold) referring to artist Wim Delvoye’s wit, deals with resisting methods and possible alternatives. As today, hypercapitalism seems to be the only reasonable economic model, contemporary artists’ political involvement is slightly different from the activists’ in the 1970’s. This exhibition shows artists whose criticizing positions aren’t as obvious, using infiltration strategies in everyday life, giving way to situations or objects that may improve the world or reveal its system. Out of the art sphere into the world, the artworks melt down with social and economic reality. Not necessarily bringing a solution, they cause instability, awkwardness or short-circuits. Humor is much used as a criticizing tool to a nonetheless serious cause.

As an infiltration expert, Gianni Motti got to attend the 53rd Session of the Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights in Geneva. He took the place of the, then missing Indonesia representant talking about ethnic minorities. Matthieu Laurette acts as another secret agent, infiltrating several TV shows without telling he’s an artist. Pushing the limits of the media and capitalist system, the artist got well known through his “refunded eating” lifestyle. In the same way, Wim Delvoye created an obligation in 2004 with the turds recreated by his famous Cloaca machine, a copy of the human digestive system. It took several years and a few lawyers to the Belgian artist to convince the Bank Chamber of Belgium to validate the capitalization of a company based on the value of shit. Cildo Meireles is another artist using economic infrastructures to deliver his message : he bought bottles of Coca-Cola, wrote the motto “Yankees go home !” on them then introduced them back on the shelves of supermarkets in Brazil.

By using the same sand grain strategy, Fréderic Pradeau displayed a huge Chinese translation of the weekly working time limit law in the heart of Paris Chinatown. Anthony Peskine also intervenes in public spaces by adding little posters where the words “OU PAS” (or not) can be read after declarative phrases as “Together, everything becomes possible” on billboards. The artist takes part at the commercial rhetoric, putting it all in jeopardy with only those two words. Julien Prévieux also gave a rather sarcastic feedback as Wolf von Kries’ boomerang by collecting Nicolas Sarkozy’s fingerprints. Sarkozy who was then interior minister had just reinforced the police’s means of control.

Utopia can sometimes lead to this type of confrontation to reality : Julien Berthier designed the véhicule Parasite. In order to move, this alternative means of transportation has to be attached to the back of a car or connected to an electrical plug, but in both cases, you have to negotiate with the car’s or the plug’s owner. Minerva Cuervas also wanted a better life by creating in 1998 Mejor Vida Corporation. Allora & Calzadilla created a collective means of expression by placing giant chalk sticks in order to collect the inhabitant’s protestations during Lima’s Iberian-American Biennial. “Calling for public expression” is also what Jean-Luc Moulène aims at with his strike objects. The artist displayed objects that were created or transformed for the workers’ social struggles during their strikes. Santiago Sierra responded to the law against saving and investment beyond 250$ by using the sound of the demonstrations this law occasioned in Argentina recorded on September 7th 2002. He gave thousands of copies of these iron-beating sounds in order to have them played simultaneously in main trade centers of the world as London, Vienna, Frankfurt, New York and Madrid.

Invited in 2007 for the Sharjah biennial in a luxury hotel, Leopold Kessler installed a system to empty the hotel’s swimming pool and distribute the water out in the streets. Acting like a hacker, Jean-Baptiste Bayle created My own Space. In this Myspace-like internet site, sponsored ads and links lead the visitor to artistic or activist projects websites. Matthieu Clainchard reacted to a law against free-parties by organizing a free-party in a supermarket. Under the Paul Tourtelle identity, he invited fifty people for a performance inside a Paris supermarket. Walking through Corsica streets wearing a hood, Seulgi Lee explained to the nationalists that she was fighting for Afghanistan women’s freedom. Johanna Fournier also tried to create social encounters by building a Belvedere from where her neighbors could see her, whereas Fayçal Baghriche went in the subway to read his CV.

By shifting between gallery space and public space, between utopia and disillusion, the artists from Mieux vaut être un virus que tomber malade have created alternative, absurd and stealth strategies.